“Putin will never abandon his ambition of conquering Ukraine, and convincing him to do so shouldn’t be the aim of Ukraine’s global supporters. Instead, the goal should be to make it impossible for Putin to fulfill that ambition. In simpler terms: You can’t make Putin walk away from Ukraine; you have to put Ukraine out of his reach.
Trump and some of his top aides do not seem to understand this about Putin.”
“Russia is catching up to Ukraine in drone production thanks to greater financial resources, production lines far from the front lines and especially help from China, a senior Ukrainian official told POLITICO.
“Chinese manufacturers provide them with hardware, electronics, navigation, optical and telemetry systems, engines, microcircuits, processor modules, antenna field systems, control boards, navigation. They use so-called shell companies, change names, do everything to avoid being subject to export control and avoid sanctions for their activities,” said Oleh Aleksandrov, spokesperson for the Ukrainian Foreign Intelligence Service. “Yet officially, China sticks to all the rules. Yet only officially.”
Beijing has repeatedly denied supplying any drones or weapons components to Russia, calling Ukrainian protests “baseless accusations and political manipulation.” But Aleksandrov said Russia has a critical dependency on the supply of Chinese spare parts for both tactical and long-range drones.”
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“Pavlo Palisa, a former top military commander and now deputy head of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office, said in a statement that so far this year, 80 percent of the damage to Russia’s equipment and personnel has been done with drones. In May alone, Ukrainian drones destroyed 89,000 Russian targets.”
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“Kyiv says that its access to new drones has been curtailed by China, while Beijing has placed no such restrictions on Russia.”
‘Already in 1993/1994, [Russia] had begun to make threatening language and gestures toward its neighbors. In 1994 the president of Estonia made a speech about how happy Estonia was to be a member of Europe and about the reemergence of a threat from Russia. He was already hearing language from Russia threatening Estonia sovereignty and whether Estonia was really an independent country. At this speech, the deputy mayor of Saint Petersburg, Vladimir Putin, walked out. The language of threat from Russia began in the 90s. In 2005 there was a large cyber attack on Estonia. This is why these countries wanted to join NATO, because they felt a reasonable direct threat from Russia.’
NATO is not a direct threat to Russia’s homeland, and it is only a threat to Russia’s interests if Russia has the intention of dominating its neighbors. Russia’s interest in Ukraine is not primarily defensive, but imperial.
There was almost no U.S. military presence in Eastern Europe until Russia stole Crimea with military force.
The global south’s response to Russia’s invasion has been disappointing because it is not just a European issue. The invasion violates the global norm that you don’t change borders by force.
“U.S. Cyber Command paused offensive operations aimed at Russia for a day earlier this year as a negotiating tactic, House Armed Services Committee cyber subcommittee Chair Don Bacon (R-Neb.) confirmed Friday.”
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“While Bacon did not elaborate on the negotiations, the pause likely happened around the time Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was visiting the White House to negotiate a minerals deal with President Donald Trump — a deal that fell through after a contentious Oval Office meeting.”
“A huge fire that burned the largest shopping center in the Polish capital Warsaw to the ground a year ago was set deliberately by people acting on behalf of Russia, Donald Tusk said Sunday.
European countries, particularly those in the east of the bloc, have been plagued by Russian espionage in recent years. Arson attacks are another common tool used as part of Russia’s hybrid warfare strategy.
“We now know for sure that the great fire of the Marywilska shopping center in Warsaw was caused by arson ordered by Russian special services,” Tusk said. “Some of the perpetrators have already been detained, all the others are identified and [are being] sought. We will get you all!”
Tusk had said in March that evidence from Lithuania suggested Russia was to blame for the attack, in line with suspicions in Poland, but his statement on Sunday was unequivocal in assigning responsibility to Russia.
The Lithuanian investigation found that a May 9, 2024 arson attack on an IKEA store in Vilnius, as well as the May 12, 2024 Marywilska fire, were set by Ukrainian citizens acting on behalf of Russia, Tusk wrote in March. A week earlier, Polish prosecutors had said a Belarusian refugee was responsible.”
“If Washington truly abandons its role as the world’s police officer, Europe would struggle to counter Russian President Vladimir Putin’s army, at least in that time frame. Many European countries, especially Germany, have neglected their own military in recent decades. While Russia has converted everything to a war economy, parts of Europe have only just woken up from the dream of a peaceful world. Military experts proclaim that it will take more than four years to manufacture an arsenal of conventional weapons of the size needed to counter a Russian invasion. While most observers consider a Russian attack on Germany unlikely, even this is not an impossible scenario.
That’s why, to deter Russia, Germany and Europe need their own nuclear shield.”
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“relying solely on France seems risky especially with French nationalist Marine Le Pen, a known Russia sympathizer, or another figure from her nationalist party potentially taking over the Élysée Palace in the near future. A broader European solution also involving Britain’s nuclear capabilities — and possibly Poland as a front-line state — would be far more prudent.”